Anna Vocino, Star on Free Radio, Interview

The Virgina native is a graduate of Emory University in Atlanta, where she helped to create the Whole World Theater with Lance Krall and others. Although it was not the intention of its founders, an improvisational comedy troupe was formed and together they have written and produced and starred in vehicles such as The Lance Krall Show. Currently, Vocino can be seen playing the annoyed co-host to Krall on the sublime Free Radio. The first season finale can be seen tonight on VH1 (check local listings for times in you area).

Pop-Rock Candy Mountain recently spoke with Vocino about Free Radio and making your family proud through the Young And The Restless.

Pop-Rock Candy Mountain (PRCM): I read where you that majored in history at Emory. Did you take Dr. (Kenneth) Stein’s class on Middle Eastern History with President Carter?
Anna Vocino: No, I wish I had. My focus was on early modern Europe and early modern Japan. I took classes from every other region but that one (laughs).
PRCM: Do you miss living in the South?
AV: I miss the food. And I love springtime in the South. I bet Atlanta is gorgeous right now.

PRCM: How did you get involved with Whole World Theater?
AV: There were eight of us that started it–we’ve literally been working together for-ev-er–like our entire adult lives, which is probably sad and scary (laughs). We all started that–we just got together because we loved improv. It’s still going today. That makes me so happy.

PRCM: Were you guys excited when you were given the opportunity to do The Lance Krall Show?
AV: I was so excited. And I was happy that Lance decided to take the whole company back to Atlanta. It actually cost less money to make the show in Atlanta than it would to have shot it in LA. It was really cool. We were able to get locations for dirt cheap. One time, we just showed up at this public tennis court and started shooting. We shot for about three hours and then a cop came up. And we thought, “Oh man,, he’s going to arrest us.” But, he was like, “Hey what are you guys doing? Can I be in it?. We were like, “Sure, come on over…” (laughs) We had a lot of fun doing that show.

PRCM: Let’s talk about Free Radio. Are you involved with the creative process of the show?
AV: Obviously Lance created it and he and his producers developed the storyline for the characters. But it’s all improvised. When Tony Hawk was coming on, we knew that there were certain questions we were going to ask him, but we had no idea how he was going to respond. It was the motorcycle versus the scooter episode. Lance asked Tony Hawk if he thought motorcycles were cool because it was Tony Hawk, an extreme sports guy. Other than little things like that, it’s all improvised. I loved the Marylene Rajskub episode, because I had been waiting for someone to freak out on him physically and she did.

We love this show. Some of the messages that Lance has been getting or that I have been getting are amazing. For the most part, people get it, but you get the “You are a terrible interviewer” things as well. When Lance told Angela Kinsey from The Office that they “need to make the show more like Friends“–obviously he’s spoofing the belief that you can only shoot sitcoms in the four-camera format. I think the show may be a bit confusing on VH1 because there is nothing else like it on the network. I love some Rock Of Love and Celebrity Rehab–I can’t stop watching it. (laughs)

I hope that Free Radio can connect with some people because we love making it and it is getting good reviews. I hope that we have a different angle to the whole “Hollywood celebrity parody thing.”

PRCM: What led you to doing the voice-over work?
AV: I’ve always been a singer and when I came to LA, I decided to do commercial work. I love being behind a mike without a camera on me. I just feel so at ease. So, I put a demo together and now I have eight different demos and I work with different people–I just love it. I actually do Brit voices for people–people tend to get less angry when they are put on hold by someone with a British accent. (laughs) I was so excited when Don LaFontaine was on Free Radio. I kept asking him all of these nerdy voice over question–”What type of mike do you use?” (laughs) It was totally nerdy.

PRCM: How did you like doing the Young And The Restless? Did you get to hang out and have cocktails with Victor Newman?
AV: I have been watching that since I was little with my grandmother. I did five episodes of the show, but it was all voice over work, so I didn’t get to meet anyone. I would just show up at 6:30 AM on the CBS lot, do a couple of takes and leave–that’s the bad part of doing voice-over work. My work on the Young and the Restless is the ONE thing that my family is most proud of–I think one of my lines was “Flight 373, now boarding for China,” like it’s just going to all of China. I told my mom about it and she was like “Oh My God, you’ve made it!” (laughs)

1 Comment

What a neat interview. I have never met Anna, but I believe she is the female voice counterpart to mine for an onhold company out of Atlanta…I’ll have to show my wife the interview….Oh, this is weird, I’m also a Virginia native.